October 29th, 1997 to November 4th, 1997

Life Changes

Celebrity gossip and fun community benefit galas serve their purpose. At times, we need to set aside the depressing realities that often impact our everyday lives. The gay community faces all the challenges the wider world does, and then its own specific and familiar ones. This edition of Outlines reflects both the warzone and playground aspects of our lives.

In addition to AIDS, intentional violence, and hate, we lose gay men and lesbians everyday due to other causes.

As we go to press this week, Outlines' columnist Jon-Henri Damski is in critical condition at a Chicago hospital, suffering the final stages of his cancer-related illness. Damski has been a steady and vital force in Chicago's gay community for more than two decades, and his voice has been slowly silenced by an internal killer.

In this week's issue, we have two very serious cover stories on issues which often get brushed aside by mainstream society. How many times have we heard jokes about rape of male prisoners? How "you deserve to go to prison ... you know what they're gonna do to you there." The threat of male rape is perhaps higher in the gay community-because of the added "date rape" element many women are all too familiar with. But men are the least likely to report sexual assault, and internalized homophobia can often further silence the survivors of male rape.

Our other cover story is about the courageous journey of Daphne Scholinski, who overcame psychiatric "treatment" during her teen years to become a thriving lesbian writer. This "treatment" occurred in Chicago in the 1980s, and it is still happening today.

Sometimes, we must step back to see clearly what has become too familiar. We must learn from and build on our own history, by both embracing the fun of being queer, and seeking to understand and prevent the dangers that so often impact our queer lives.

-Tracy Baim, Publisher

Letters

Skinheads on the 'Net
I came across a forwarded e-mail of a past article you [Yvonne Zipter] did for Outlines. Your horrible misinterpretation of what it is to be a skinhead and gay is by far the most disgusting display of typical "journalism" today. If you knew anything (or wanted to learn anything about) gay skinheads, you would have done your homework. Skinheads have a past which I doubt you even know about. Instead you type out words for all to see as if you were a writer for the Geraldo Rivera Show.
I'm also left to assume from your article that you are from the camp that thinks all skinheads are racists, uneducated, and boorish. I hate to break it to you, but I'm college educated and proud to be of mixed cultural heritage. So what do you have left to stand on in your defense? When I say words like brotherhood, togetherness, and assertive does it send you into a panic? I'm just trying to understand your views. ... Your disinformation has done nothing but put me off (even more) to gay media. Let me help you out with your job:

http://www.vt.edu:10021/J/jadare/skinhead

http://www.vt.edu:10021/J/jadare/skinhead/faq.html

http://www.geocities.com/WestHollywood/4388/skin.html

I may also offer you a book: Gay Skins, by Murray Healy

Shane Tanner

http://www.geocities.com/WestHollywood/6738

I'd love to know exactly what you find so scary about queer Skinheads. I am one.

Had you bothered to follow any of the links from the QSB site, you would have been able to write something other than the Geraldo-inspired "OOOOOO! All Skinheads are Nazis! I saw it on TEEVEE so it must be true!" drivel [in the column].

I am CCing this to Outlines in the hope that they will print it in the 'Letters' column. That way, anyone who actually wants to get information-as opposed to publishing sneering, one-dimensional smear articles-can do so. Queer Skinhead Brotherhood:

http://www.geocities.com/WestHollywood/6136

Allen James Shrapnel

http://www.geocities.com/westhollywood/7032

Columnist Zipter's descriptions about what the skinhead web pages are about were almost entirely taken off the websites themselves. There was never any connection made to Nazis. She also listed the web pages so readers could make up their own minds. In addition, her approach to each of the pages mentioned was with a sense of humor-lesbians do have a sense of humor, despite what some people think.
Zipter wrote, in pact: "By far the scariest web site I visited was the Queer Skinhead Brotherhood, which sounds like an oxymoron to me if there ever was one. But, if there can be gay Republicans and gay Fundamentalists, why not gay skinheads? What's perhaps even scarier, there were actually five organizations to choose from. I picked 'the first and only American-based Queer Skinhead group on the net'; it seemed like the patriotic thing to do. I learned that 'the last real men' have such qualities as being 'intolerant of ... something', 'assertive, not diplomatic', and 'guardians [sic], protectors, and defenders of male energy.' I'd tell you more, but I couldn't make sense of half what they said, in spite of great slogans like 'Ribbons are for wankers, support whatever the hell you want and wear boots!' and 'Your SKiN Is Your Uniform' and 'Fuck bill Gates.'
Correction
In our recent article on gays and lesbians in Naperville, we listed the name of one "open and affirming" church incorrectly. The church's full name is First Congregational United Church of Christ, 25 E. Benton, in Naperville, (630) 355-1024.

We welcome letters to the editor: typed, double-spaced, and short. Shorter letters are more likely to make it into print. Send to Outlines Letters, 1115 W. Belmont, Suite 2-D,Chicago, IL 60657, FAX(773) 871-7609, or e-mail outlines@suba.com

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